


Breaking Point

by IceEckos12



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Body Horror, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, M/M, inspired by the wonderful art floating around on tumblr, moth jon, no one dies, written before 163
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 04:49:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23965669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IceEckos12/pseuds/IceEckos12
Summary: The thing that people don't tell you about breaking points is that you don't know it's coming. Of course, ridiculous, that is thepointof a breaking point. They are so brutally shocking, so lightning-quick, that there is no chance to bend.You justbreak.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 42
Kudos: 448





	Breaking Point

**Author's Note:**

> thought id explore monster jon a little.
> 
> heads up - someone does get shot in this. no one dies, tho!!

Theoretically, Jon is very familiar with breaking points.

That's his job, after all. Or it _was_ his job. The point is, by the end of his time as Archivist, Jon had become very familiar with the tone of a person at their lowest. _I need help, please. Please help me. I thought I was going to die. If I lose him, if I lose her, if I lose them, then nothing will have been worth it. Please._

But the concepts associated with those awful moments, the sequence of emotions which eventually leads to earth-shattering, life-altering terror, is very distant. He can tell you in the most clinical, abstract terms what it's like to feel like your world has just ended, but he couldn't give you his own personal account of it.

(He supposes that he can give an _almost_ account. The apocalypse had been close, very close. But then Martin had run into the room, shouting his name, and Jon had thought _things will be okay._

He supposes that it's the years of constantly escalating horror. Prentiss had been bad, but she had only been the beginning of a long series of things and people out to hurt him. He's desensitized to it all, he thinks. Nothing can shatter the cold armor built by the multitudes of things out to kill him.)

Except—

He is walking through a shattered world, the one he loves at his side. The world is terrible and awful and a host of other things, but it doesn't stop them from sharing moments of lightness, of laughter. Jon looks at Martin's face, and he thinks, _for him, I will make things okay._

And that's when Martin erupts in a shower of blood, and Jon can feel tiny droplets spatter across his face. They stare at each other for a moment, Jon agape, Martin faintly befuddled, as though he's wondering why Jon's stopped laughing at the joke.

And then he lets out a quiet, terrible noise, and drops to the ground.

Jon should be at his side, checking the injury. He should be telling Martin that it was going to be okay, that he was safe, Jon would make sure of it. There are a lot of things that he should be doing at this moment, but there is still blood on his face and Martin is silent as the dead and he is so terribly, monstrously human.

The thing that people don't tell you about breaking points is that you don't know it's coming. Of course, _ridiculous,_ that is the _point_ of a breaking point. They are so brutally shocking, so lightning-quick, that there is no chance to bend.

You just _break._

(It's just some poor starving bastard who thought that Jon and Martin looked like easy marks. He was just after the extra can of beans he thought they had with them, which they would have happily handed over, because this is the fucking _apocalypse,_ and no one actually needs to eat anymore, but not everyone has figured it out yet.)

There is a moment of silence—

Jon's vision explodes, the world around him painted over with ripples, with layers of colors he doesn't have names for, with the paths of the people who'd once lived here—

(Molly Grey was a mother of three who had picked up a job after her youngest finally started going to school, because her husband was a construction worker and it wasn't the most lucrative job in the world, and she wanted to get Andrew that book he liked so much—

Terry Andrews was a college student in his final year, and he'd decided against going to graduate school because what was the point, he had more caffeine than blood at this point anyway, this fucking education had stolen enough time from him—)

And then he can see more _, more,_ points of view that feel strange and right, and they're blossoming across his skin, and he can see the Eye and the Panopticon above, the terrified face of the man before him, Martin _on the ground red covered in blood—_

His shirt explodes, and through the eyes on his back he can see two crumpled _things_ grow up _, up,_ impossibly large, almost twice the height of himself. They spread and flap, spattering liquid onto the ground, and then he is seeing from them as more eyes sprout from the center of his brand new wings. Not bird's wings, delicate and finely feathered, but moth's wings, smooth and watching.

" **_You will pay,"_ **the Archive tells the man, the pathetic insect, who thought he could hurt what was theirs.

The man drops the gun and starts running in the other direction, terrified. The Archive takes a menacing step forward, gleeful with the knowledge that they could follow this man and never tire, never run out if energy, chase this man into the _ground—_

"Jon," someone says.

The Archive pauses. Not necessarily because of the name, the voice, but because there is a hand on their arm, a balancing weight. They blink their many eyes, and something says to them, _that is Martin._

(The bullet had caught Martin in the arm. It was messy, sure, and certainly painful, but not a fatal wound. It looked worse than it was.)

The Archive trembles.

“Jon, please,” Martin tightens his grip around the Archive’s arm and limps around so they’re facing each other. All of the Archive’s eyes flicker to the bloody sleeve, and Martin lets out a tiny _oh_ and takes a half-step back at the sudden intensity.

A hundred tape recorders manifest around them, and that miniscule sound is echoed around amongst the constant hiss and click of the recorder like a symphony of terror.

Martin grits his teeth and lifts his hand from the Archive’s arm to their face. It’s a calculated risk, the Archive can feel this, because _Martin’s not sure how much of Jon is left in there anymore, there’s every chance that if Martin lets go or stops being interesting then the Archive will keep marching forward, intent on their terrible justice, but he has to try—_

The eyes do not move from Martin. The Archive is curious at what this creature plans to do, and there is something—else, telling them not to leave. Their wings open and close slowly, curious. Expectant.

“I’m okay, Jon,” Martin whispers, lifting his good arm up and around the Archive’s shoulders, gently, so gently. He doesn’t grimace as he gathers the Archive to him, even though it must hurt, even though the eyes must be off-putting. “You can stop now.”

The Archive _trembles._ The tape recorders, which have been hissing steadily, silently, until this moment, replay the terrible sound that Martin had made before he dropped to the ground. Then the Archive’s layered, echoing voice, emanating from every angle, **_“You will pay.”_ **

“I know,” Martin gasps out, a sob hitching on the end of his words. “But you can _stop_ now. What, are you just going to let me bleed out?”

There is a long, long silence, except for the constant hissing of the tapes.

And then one of the eyes in the Archive’s beautiful moth wings closes. Then a second, then a third, and the wings are slowly folding, crumpling into each other, into the Archive’s exposed back. The other eyes are starting to close now, bit by bit, and Martin holds onto the Archive, resting his chin on their shoulder, and waits.

Jon _gasps_ back into himself, and his arms come up and grasp Martin to him, and he is sobbing, _weeping_ with terror, choking on every human breath. “I thought I lost you,” he whispers, clawing at Martin’s shirt, trembling. “I thought I—I thought—”

 _“Shhh,”_ Martin whispers, pressing Jon’s temple against his cheek, “I know. I know.”

They’re quiet for a couple more seconds, Jon ragged and bereft, Martin pressing kisses to the side of Jon’s face, to his hair, wherever he can reach, whispering _I’m okay_ and _shhh, everything is fine now._ Jon knows that he should feel disgusting, face smeared with snot and tears, but he thought that his whole world almost just expired in the middle of a deserted, desiccated street.

An indeterminate amount of time later, Martin says, hesitant, “Jon, I don’t mean to...to ruin the moment or anything, but I’m still bleeding.”

Jon chokes and immediately shoves Martin into a sitting position. “Oh my _god_ Martin why didn’t you say anything _earlier—”_


End file.
